Later, while growing up, I noticed my brain noticing plants or tree details, auto mapping them to possible genre, trying to find out, trying to memorize... but not always voluntarily, meaning that i felt like I was much more attracted and focused on plants and tree details and recognition after a certain age.
Something similar happened with birds, my brain started recording and recognizing the different birds sounds, and I started recognizing birds types more. Like something that before was a random signal or a bunch of sounds suddenly with age started having patterns and clear distinctions that attracted my brain and memory, and I simply started being able to distinguish birds by just hearing them.
I love it, I observe, I listen, I learn. I use the plant apps and birdnet for the bird soiunds (from CornellLab and Technical university of Chemnitz). Cool projects, lovely apps and interesting tech usage. I'm planning to upgrade terrace with constant camera feed for auto-detection.
But the main point is, does anybody relate to this grown interest to plants and bird distinction with age? is it something known and defined? it kinda feels like part of a biological evolution related to age, but no idea.
I do, and I've seen it in others, but from the limited data points I've seen there's no causal relationship with age. I.e. what I've seen is people largely oblivious of nature/ecosystems/flora/fauna sudenly becoming very invested in it, for various reasons, but this doesn't happen at or only beyond a certain age. For me it was around 30 but that's simply because of a series of coincidences (new house, large garden, needed solution for mowing, happened to see a 2nd hand scythe, looked into grassland ecology, etc). But I know people whos obsession started at 16 and at 60 and like everything in between.
It's deeply rewarding to find the world around becoming deeper and more intricately connected. And you get to see more of it every day!
I have also seen this obsessive focus in sports fans: What was the half-season where Pat Maroon played on the New Jersey Devils as a rental? Well they made the playoffs that year which must have been Taylor Hall's MVP Award Season and ah yes! that had to be 2017-18!
meaning that i feel it was a change also triggered by other factors and life conditions, or even a reaction to those, but at the same time I realize that my brain started receiving and analyzing and appreciating those signal, not me completely voluntary.
one thing that comes always to my mind is the possible reason of reaction to shitty work and work related stress that makes us crave for nature and nature contact, like a story of a friend stopping the car just to touch grass with the feet.
I relate to an approximate after 30 thing too. But in my case nature contact was reduced compare to initial life part, and I got a garden after that.
But again, it feels like an over semplifcation or easy shortcut, and I believe there is maybe just something innate that blooms at a certain point.
how can we get more datapoints for this? I was trying to crowdsource here :)
I'm sure that's a thing for some people. And there's research to back that up IIRC. Even seemingly silly things like the smell of a wet forest being beneficial.
One aspect which stood out for me is 'awareness'. I find it deeply fascinating how many people, as I used to be one, can just stroll through everyday locations without even knowing the names of the most common plants let alone think about their connection to the surroundings. Once I started to realize how unaware I was of this I started forzing myself to be more aware and it's fascinating how much there can be going on in like even 1 square meter of nature. And of which I only know a fraction.
And for me this is really meditative - even though it's somewhat counterintuitive. Meditation is usually about clearing the mind, but for me being in nature and filling my mind with thoughts about the whole interconnection of individuals in ecosystems can bring peace and relaxation. Well, as long as I do not think about how we're collectively destroying a lot of it.
For me, it's really just trees though. Birds and other wildlife are nice, but they don't draw my interest in the same way.
I have a similar interest but mine is about passively assimilating foreign languages while watching movies. Every time I grok a new expression it feels like a rush of dopamine.
maybe is just how our brain is wired and predisposed to such things that let us notice and enjoy this evolution or process?